Dear Juliet

Once upon a time a beautiful love story between two young, pure souls blossomed in a city full of anger, hate and revenge. Their love superseded their families, friends and even their own destinies. 

A city as Verona was too small and a time for their story was too short for a love like this! 

Their love - tragic but yet poetic, eternal - breathes forever through the walls of this house, through the city of Verona, through the lungs of any lover...

I visited the small museum inside the house, I ignored the noisy crowds of tourists and I stayed for a moment under the balcony with my heart wide open:     

"But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?

It is the East, and Juliet is the sun.

Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,

Who is already sick and pale with grief,

That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.

Be not her maid since she is envious.

Her vestal livery is but sick and green,

And none but fools do wear it. Cast it off!

It is my lady. Oh, it is my love."

With their hearts entangled forever, Romeo and Juliet live here... everywhere. 

And here is the proof! ;)

Not the end.

The Last Nude, Ellis Avery

"I only met Tamara de Lempicka because I needed a hundred francs. This was sixteen years ago. I had just learned that if I had a black dress with a white collar, I could take over my flatmate's department store job. In 1927, you could get a bed or a bicycle for three hundred francs; one hundred was a fair price to pay for a ready-made dress, but I didn't have it."

"Every day I posed for Beautiful Rafaela, I experienced the same thing. First, the simple strangeness of being naked in a place not designed for nudity. Being naked in a room whose other inhabitants was clothed. Being naked in a room with windows, even if no one could see into the room from the outside. A separate shock: being naked in a room with windows open to every stir of summer breeze. Then, as I moved into the pose, I felt two separate waves of lust: one of myself, just wanting the workday to be over so I could drag Tamara off to bed; the second, oddly, as the woman in the painting. The glow from the window fell plumb down my body from sternum to navel until the front slab of my ribcage became a hot slam of light to the eye. The more I arched my back, the deeper that light fell across me, and the louder the voice of the painting purred in my throat: aren't I beautiful?" 

The photo was taken in the beautiful Ceainaria Infinitea. 

Vertical Forest, Milan

Have you ever seen a vertical forest?

Designed by Boeri Studio, Bosco Vericale is the name of two amazing residential towers (110 and 76 m height) in Porta Nuova district. I arrived in Milan around 10.30 PM and I got off the subway at Gioia Station where I saw their shapes in the night. From the distance, they looked exactly like a vertical forest. Next morning I've started my day with a visit in the neighborhood.

The towers house more than 700 trees with heights between three and six meters, 5000 shrubs and 11000 floral plants, the equivalent of a hectare of forest. The vegetation of the two towers protects the residents from dust, attenuates the noise and produces oxygen. 

In 2014, Bosco Verticale won the International Highrise Award. I totally agree with the jury president, Christoph Ingenhoven "the Vertical Forest is an expression of the human need for contact with nature". Imagine if all our houses would be surrounded by nature and our neighbors would be humans and trees as well. You may not like a neighbor, but you can never not like a tree! :)

Bosco Verticale

World Expo 2015, Milan. Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life

The universal exhibition of 2015, hosted in Milan from May 1 to October 31, is built on the same way as the Romans planned their cities on two main streets, Decumano, oriented from east to west and Cardo, oriented from north to south. 

On both sides of the two axes of the exhibition there are 145 participating countries that present in each of their pavilions the idea of providing healthy food for everyone, using the natural resources of our Planet. Every country proudly shows their traditional values and how it understands to use the new technology available nowadays in order to respect the Planet and its needs and equilibrium.

I do not know who is going to win this "competition" (fingers crossed for UK, my favorite pavilion) but I hope that this universal event will be a win win situation for all the participant countries and a great opportunity for all of us to reflect upon the conscious decisions that we have to take regarding food production, wasted food and available resources that we have on our Planet. It is sad that we live in a world in which there are people starving or even die due to the lack of food and, on the other hand, there are people who suffer or die from diseases related to obesity or too much processed food. 

Designed by the artist Wolfgang Buttress, the UK pavilion is inspired by the role of the bee in our ecosystem and invites you to an imaginary flight of a bee. As you enter the pavilion, you walk through a wildflower meadow and the journey stops in a spherical void inside the center of a huge aluminum beehive. Through the lights, vibration and sound, the hive simulates the atmosphere of a real beehive. Close your eyes for a moment, listen to the bees around you and be happy to experience such an incredible feeling of another form of life. Congratulations, UK! You really made my day.

At the Japan pavilion was a long waiting line, but the experience created by the host was very diverse from sublime, poetic at the beginning to very amusing at the end. The theme of the exhibition was "Harmonious diversity". Using a moving installation, mirrors, video and audio systems they created a magical space to show the visitors the picturesque landscape and the traditions of Japan.
I even had the pleasure to have for the first time in my life a virtual dinner in a restaurant of the future. I choose my dish gently tapping with chopsticks on a media tablet, installed on the table in front of me, as a plate. Every dish has an explanation of the recipe and I could choose my food according to my favorite season and culinary preferences.

At the end of my visit of the Japan pavilion, I just needed some real food so I have tried for the first time in my life the Dutch weed burger at the open-air Netherlands pavilion. 100% vegetarian, tasty and healthy. "Eat weed, live long."

Checked! :)

The Morocco pavilion offers you a journey of flavors. Shadows, mandarins, sand, aromatic teas, dates and spices are all in the service of awakening your senses. And they do know how to lay down at your feet an unique experience.

 

The French did an original open air market hall as a symbol of their traditional open air markets from any French city. Initially organized as a place for exchanging products between people from the cities and people from the countryside, nowadays they became habitual places of gathering people to buy from local farms high quality food, fresh and less expensive since you buy it directly from the producer. These markets are open only two days a week and strolling through this colorful places is a delightful habit that may create addiction. :)

At the end, but not at least, I proudly present you the pavilion of my country: Romania.

 

...and several pictures from other pavilions I've liked.

  

Have an inspired day, help the others and be gentle with our beautiful home, the Earth!